The Final Ceilidh

The Celtic "thing" seems to be getting bigger all the time in the music world. New bands with Celtic names that have to be explained to 99% of the UK population are being formed. In Scotland every January there is a big music festival called the Celtic Connections Festival and I feel a bit excluded from this. I don't have any Celtic connections and this doesn't bother me one way or the other but I'm a bit fed up with hearing how wonderful Celtic things are, especially as Celts ceased to exist a very long time ago. So, I've created a rival festival for everyone who has no Celtic connections, called the Non-Celtic Connections Fest to be held in Dudley or Peterborough or Norwich or somewhere else suitably non-Celtic.. It will run at the same time as the Celtic Connections but you won't be allowed in if you have any Celtic connections. I will re-direct you to the festival in Scotland. By the way, if you didn't know, a ceilidh (pronounced kaylee) is a barn dance and Siobahn (pronounced Shervorn) is an Irish girl's name. The Copper Family were a well known traditional a capella folk singing group from Sussex. Brum is Birmingham. Thanks. Rob

The Final Ceilidh by Rob Barratt

At the non-Celtic Connections Fest There are oodles of Angles, stacks of Saxons Rastafarians, Bavarians and English vegetarians It's a weird do, no Irish stew No bodhrans, no sporrans No ulian pipes, no anti-English gripes No Merbyn Kernow or Plaid Cymru stands No incessantly droning bagpipe bands No Breton ballads, no haggis salads There's a smattering of Alsatians, CroatiansAnd many, many other nations But no Celtic words, strangely spelt And not one single singing Celt

Morris dancers in the middle No Welsh harp, nary a fiddle Bangkok ladyboys in wigs No reels, no jigs African drums from Chad and Gambia Rhythmic South American samb-ia Antarctic penguins wing-flapping Spanish flamenco hand clapping Gurus with didgeridoos in queues for portaloos, happy crapping The whole thing so energy sapping Internationalism at its best At the non-Celtic Connections Fest

A small Siberian shamanist Demonstrates the pagan twist There goes a Viking, mountain biking A Bodmin poet, open miking Films of polar ice melting But no fields full of Celts "celting" No one called Siobahn or Alex No Cornish, no Gallics Marquees full of Vietnamese refugees Senegalese, Chinese, Somalis And you can listen out but you will not Hear a Gaelic air sung by a Scot

Chavs from Essex, Goths from Kent In the Aboriginal tent Indonesians in sarongs Singing Copper Family songs Masai tribesmen flogging cars Russians propping up the bars Native Americans and Laps With Geisha girls eating bacon baps Foreign accents of every inflection But none with any Celtic connection

But on the last night of the fest They'll all dress up in Sunday best Fire eaters, clowns on stilts (But nobody in bloody kilts) They'll all head down to the big main stage Colourful saris, cardigans of beigeAnd they'll congregate for one last dance Stand on the side and then advance Onto the floor to give it some Swedes from Sweden, Brummies from Brum Then everybody will hold hands And festival-goers from non-Celtic lands Each Thai, Palestinian and Israeli Will come together for the final…….. ceilidh